Sunday, November 27, 2016

Level reconfigurations

After two weeks off, I'm trying to get back into revising some of these levels using some of what I learned in the last few builds. I was unhappy with how I introduced bounce walls and unhappy with how I introduced switches, so I created, deleted, and/or edited several of the levels having to do with those concepts.

Here's the new level which introduces bounce walls. The old level immediately combined bounce walls with wrap walls, and I wanted to start simpler than that. I was at first afraid of using more than two linked goal nodes, but then I realized that more goal nodes doesn't always make a level more difficult. In this case, they actually call out what the player is supposed to be doing.

I apply the same idea here. This used to be the first level with bounce walls, now it's the second. I added the northern and southern linked goal node to again call out to the player what it is they're supposed to be doing. It also prevents you from simply moving to the western node, hitting it, and moving around the bounce wall to hit the eastern node.

This is the new introductory level for switches. It really looks insane, but the idea is that only one switch is available at any time, and hitting each switch closes off the part of the level you're done with and shoves you on to the next part. It ends with a switch that turns off the kill walls surrounding the central goal item. I believe I got too fancy by adding the enemy and the warp walls. I may just delete them to make this a bit more reasonable.

All in all, I think these are good changes. These levels are also a lot more aesthetically pleasing than some of the levels they're replacing. Ideally, I want every level in the game to follow the example set by this level:

It's dynamic, it has good aesthetic and mechanical composition, and it uses all or most of the space without creating clutter or overly complex structures. I think if I can have 25-35 levels that do that, I'll be satisfied with calling this game "done."

Charging-up sound effect, as always, is by Javier Zumer. I'm using it and modifying it under this license.